William Barrett
Sheila Mikhail

As is often the case, the Supreme Court’s most recent foray into the arcane world of patent law has answered one set of questions at the expense of leaving a path strewn with new sets of unanswered questions. In Merck v. Integra, the Court reviewed a decision of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (“Federal Circuit”), answering the question whether Merck infringed Integra’s patents by using Integra’s patented compounds in preclinical research. The Court, in a brief opinion by Justice Scalia, held “no infringement.”